Why it works: Kale and agave share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 20 recipes mention both. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
The recipe
Serves 4Ingredients
Contains: milk, tree nuts (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.
Heat the oven to 400°F (204°C) and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Spoon the grated Parmesan into four small mounds on the parchment, spacing them well apart, and flatten each slightly.
Bake the Parmesan for 5 to 6 minutes, until golden and set. Let them cool on the sheet for a few minutes, then loosen them with a spatula.
While the cheese bakes, whisk the lemon juice, olive oil, agave nectar or honey, salt and pepper in a large bowl until combined.
Add the chopped kale to the bowl and toss with your hands for about a minute, massaging the dressing into the leaves until they soften slightly.
Gently halve or leave the raspberries whole, then fold them into the kale along with the toasted slivered almonds.
Divide the salad among four plates and break the cooled Parmesan crisps over the top just before serving.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Kale + agavetop 2% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together20 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Lemon + peppertop 2% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together27,039 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Olive + parmesan cheesetop 4% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together4,076 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).
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Almond + agavetop 4% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together198 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Kale + lemontop 4% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together226 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Flavor stand-ins for the almond
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (kale, lemon, olive, agave, pepper, parmesan cheese):
- Chickpeabetter flavor fit
- Beansbetter flavor fit
- Cashew nutbetter flavor fit
- Almondthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against kale, lemon, olive, agave, pepper, parmesan cheese. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
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